


Contretemps

by Riathel



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Angst, Childhood Sweethearts, Doctor Who: Academy Era, Dom/sub, Enemies With Benefits, M/M, Missing Scene, Romantic Angst, Secret Relationship, Serial: s067 Frontier in Space, Sonic Screwdriver Used as a Sex Toy (Doctor Who), introspective, revoked consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:09:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29750442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riathel/pseuds/Riathel
Summary: “You know, Doctor,” the Master began, like they were having a friendly discussion about the merits of non-Euclidean trigonometry. He was turning over a thin, cylindrical rod he held with the precision of the totally mad, a self-satisfied gleam to his eyes. “You really must explain the specifics of this…device.”The loving curl to that word, and the way he was stroking the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver — which had been new, barely even field-tested, and furthermorebelonged to him— did not go unnoticed.An all-together tiring affair,the Doctor thought darkly.—Why the Doctor and the Master don't talk anymore.
Relationships: The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who), Third Doctor/The Master (Delgado)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 4





	Contretemps

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by the scene cut in Frontier in Space where the Doctor is magically dressed again and has "lost" his sonic screwdriver.

The prison on the Earth’s moon was a bleak and desolate place — the prisoner transfer room even more so. Every part of the complex, from the ceiling to the floor, was a chalky off-white. Yet even in this dreary backdrop, it was hard to shake the knowledge that above them, somewhere in the nearby stars, two empires were preparing to go to war.

The Doctor glared at his wrinkled shirt. As if a heated stare might improve the state of his clothes, after such zealous mistreatment at the hands of his former jailors. No. Former was too misleading a word — former implied that he had found some practical way out of this prison. His trust in the leader of the Peace Party to negotiate the complexities of a prison break was perhaps given too quickly. That was the kindest explanation he had for such misplaced belief. The real, and far more difficult truth, was that prison was far too claustrophobic a concept for him to countenance after such a long time spent in exile on one planet. He knew he would have leapt at _any_ chance of escape.

But he still would have rather died of oxygen deprivation than suffer the keen gaze of his new captor. Overly close, as always. Overly interested, overly familiar, overly smug.

“You know, Doctor,” the Master began, like they were having a friendly discussion about the merits of non-Euclidean trigonometry. He was turning over a thin, cylindrical rod he held with the precision of the totally mad, a self-satisfied gleam to his eyes. “You really must explain the specifics of this… _device_.”

The loving curl to that word, and the way he was stroking the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver — which had been new, barely even field-tested, and furthermore _belonged to him_ — did not go unnoticed.

 _An all-together tiring affair_ , the Doctor thought darkly.

He was halfway stripped out of the stultifying prison outfit. At least they had kept his normal clothes, instead of incinerating them. There was something about the bottle-green velvet jacket that set him at ease. Furthermore, it was difficult to replace — Frédéric had been asleep when he had pilfered the composer’s wardrobe. The idea of it being burned in some third-rate Earth prison or, worse, tossed out to fend for itself in the mercies of space, when it held such personal and historic significance—well, it didn’t bear thinking about.

This whole experience had already been an exercise in humanity’s worst habits, without adding littering to the long list. Stubbornness. Bigotry. Humanity, as a whole, were narrow-minded, petty, thoughtless, violent creatures. Not that the Draconians were much better. This was the trouble with three-dimensional races; they lacked higher order thinking, driven by their base impulses.

He could feel the Master’s eyes on him, watching as he shed the ill-matching blue jump-suit. It was cold enough in the room without that intent stare, and it only added to his growing sense of claustrophobia; he shuddered, quite in spite of himself, and felt the remaining vestiges of his temperament break a little further.

“Work it out for yourself,” the Doctor snapped.

The Master had the audacity to smile at his outburst, still manipulating the sonic in careful, measured movements. It pulsed with light, letting out a thin whine, as if it knew who was holding it.

Then it started vibrating.

The Master stared at it for a moment, eyebrows raised. _That_ had knocked the smug smile off his face.

For a moment. Then his eyes flicked over to the Doctor, frozen in the middle of pulling off the stiff linen trousers, and he grinned.

“If you’re expecting thanks, you’re going to be sorely disappointed,” the Doctor said quickly, if only to forestall the inevitable. He refused to flush, refused to give him the satisfaction. It was bad enough that the Master had insisted on watching him change ‘on the off-chance you have something planned, my dear Doctor’ — any further indignity could scarcely be bourne at this stage. “You know it’s perfectly tiresome of you to—”

The next setting, as well he knew, altered the vibrations to a steady crescendo, fading and re-building in a five-second loop.

The Doctor flushed.

“Well, well,” said the Master, looking delighted. “Hidden multitudes have man and machine.”

The vibrations were designed to disable aurally sensitive lifeforms, based on the frequency and pitch of the sunbirds of Gallifrey. The personal massage function was unintentional, an unfortunate bug that he had been meaning to fix at some point in the next century. Of course it would enthrall the Master, so easily amused by childish buffoonery. Plastic daffodils, indeed. Pah.

The Doctor bit the inside of his cheek, ignoring the impulse to grin back.

It wasn’t funny. It was agitating. Frustrating. He was still a prisoner, a situation he actively tried to avoid on a regular basis — no matter what the Brigadier seemed to think about his propensity towards being captured.

“I expected that you came to gloat, but really this—this is—” he fumbled with both his words and his balance stepping out of the trousers. His limited patience was at the very precipice of snapping into an entirely reasonable tantrum — to that end, he kicked the trousers off. And then kicked them further again, into the corner with the rest of the cheap prison suit. There. They were free to incinerate that, and the whole rest of this miserable rock. He refused, _refused_ to have his new freedom ripped away from him again, by humanity, the Draconians, the Time Lords, or anyone.

The sonic still thrummed with vibrations. It mimicked the thready jump of his hearts, the uncomfortable pressure of them in his throat at remembering he was being stared at. He could ask if the Master had a shred of decency, but he was quite aware that the answer was a definitive no.

“Putting on weight, are we?” the Master said at length, eyes bright with interest.

“No,” he shot back, nettled, “Don’t act like this isn’t exactly what you intended.”

“If you were feeling lonely, you might have _called_ ,” the Master continued, his words curled like so much beautiful smoke, crushed velvet with flares of preening self-idolatry. They coiled inside of the Doctor, settling in places he refused to acknowledge. Filling him further with slick unease, his brain divided, oil and water, interest and revulsion.

In the span of a sentence, the situation rested on a needle’s point. The uncomfortable tension between them had awoken, as it always did, stirred by the Master’s inability to leave well enough alone. They were hardly academy fresh—or friends for that matter.

“Instead of—” The Master flicked rapidly through several settings, to one that jittered in a regular four-beat pattern, and his eyes closed, lulled into silence for several rounds, “—whatever sad excuse for intimacy that this passes for. Tell me,” he switched it off, fingering the button in the most obscene way, “does UNIT take turns holding your hand? Or do you get Miss Grant to stroke your hair lovingly? I can only hope, for their sakes, that you aren’t giving it a field test every time they beg for you to save Earth.”

“ _Enough_.”

“Is it really?” He laughed, but didn’t press the point further.

The Doctor said nothing. His fingers felt numb over his clothing. Not two minutes previous it had been such a comfort, a slide back into familiar armour. Now it was a cheap reminder that his limited freedom depended on the whims of an egotistical madman who still made him feel less than a century old.

The screwdriver landed on top of his haphazardly folded trousers. He jerked up, glancing at the Master. The other Time Lord was smiling. Smug. Damnably self-assured.

“I could escape with this,” the Doctor said, voice mild to compensate for the way his hands shook, badly, as he grabbed the sonic.

“You’re hardly chained,” the Master replied. His own TCE was out already, dainty between his first two fingers, pointed towards the opposite wall. Of course he wouldn’t hand over the sonic without his own form of insurance, even if he was playing at being a snake in long grass. “Feel free to run away at any stage... if you particularly enjoy knowing what will happen to Miss Grant will be your fault, and yours alone.”

“This isn’t a joke,” the Doctor said, softly.

“I’ve never been more serious.”

The sonic felt good in his hands. He could—he could redirect the power surge to implode the door. It would send them out the airlock, killing them both, a null-score game. That is, if it worked. And if it didn’t… They could both survive for at least five minutes in the vacuum. Five minutes was a long period for uncertainties, a long time to struggle — could he even maintain a hold on the Master for such a duration, as his own strength died along with his neurons? Would he even have the capacity to remain aware that he must, no matter death, hold on?

His skin felt tight. Overstretched. His chest burnt, all the air inside thin, like they were already in a vacuum, the mere thought of it enough to make his head spin.

Either way, succeed or fail in opening the airlock, Jo was still trapped outside of her own time and space, locked in a prison vessel orbiting a planet soon to be at war.

Did he really have a choice between that and the personal humiliation of—

“Oh, you always have a _choice_ , Doctor,” the Master cut in, chuckling. “Otherwise your submission wouldn’t be half as enjoyable. Well,” he paused, considering, and the images bled deliberately through their low-level psychic connection.

Flashes of heat. Of—

pale skin marked dusky with blood—on his knees—tight grip, grey hair—the knife, unseen, spent, used—the jagged wound across his neck—chest—stomach—

lips bloodless and begging and saying lovely words and meaning them for once—bitter taste—he held onto the other image—what did he mean—throat slit—dripping gore—sweet nothings—

he pried at it, wanting to know further the underlying taste of orange, faint notes of rose—tearing—ripping at—soft laces of temporal stability—fat unspooling from gaping wounds—amusement—laughing—

“Enough,” it was the Master’s turn to break, the force of the retreat a visible spark of tension between them. “ _Enough_ ,” he said, again. Then his face hardened: like he had made a concession he regretted. Something in the repetition that would cause the fatal flaw.

The Doctor smiled. His fingers felt feather-light, the bones and the muscles and the nerves disconnected from the rest of him as they rotated the sonic in his hands, over, and over, until it barely seemed to have ever been without motion. He still tasted oranges.

It was reassuring to know there remained some spark of tenderness, potentially what one might call compassion, in his one-time friend. The consuming intoxication of that feeling. A final submission through death.

Maybe it had been a trap. That shade of love that he had felt. He shouldn’t put it beyond the Master to engineer such an elaborate and pretty fabrication. The calculated vulnerability of memory, of what had once been theirs, ought to have sent his mind into high alert, but the thought felt so unimportant and weightless that it escaped his normally shrewd suspicion, to dwell in that indeterminate place all cast-off ideas went.

His tongue rested, cotton-thick, in the space between his teeth. The psychic bleed-through made him feel punch-drunk, on the precipice of satiation — if he could only reach further. He longed so badly to touch the undiluted memory he had grazed against by accident. That day they had spent breaking into greenhouses without tripping alarms. Overly pleased by their technical skill, the sample oranges from Sol 3 were trophies. The pulp was sticky and fibrous, a little tart in a way he disliked until he tasted it on his friend’s mouth. If he could work out a way to coax that memory to the forefront, then he just might be able to—

The hum of the TCE was a dissonant stripe of crimson, as the weapon, pointed directly at him this time, was primed.

His smile vanished.

“I anticipate you have some grand plan regarding all of this,” he said dryly, indicating the room, the base, and the situation in general with a sweep of his own device.

“Naturally,” the Master said, a trifle coldly.

“Well? You have your audience, I’m sure you don’t require a pre-emptive round of applause.” The light feeling was beginning to fade, replaced by a dull headache between the Doctor’s second and third brain stems. It heartened him only slightly to know that it would be a shared pain, brought on by the premature severing of that hasty psychic link.

It perhaps should not have heartened him, he reflected moments later. The only thing worse than the Master at his normal level of insanity was the Master when he was feeling that his position of authority was threatened.

The Master brought out a white, plastic disk, flipped it open to reveal a predictably gaudy red button, and said, “I took the liberty of rigging my ship with several hundred pounds of explosives.” The perfect calm of his voice was offset by the gleam in his eyes, the slight twist to his mouth, the stiffness of his grasp. “By all means, audience, _attend carefully_.”

“You won’t have anything to bargain with if you kill her,” the Doctor retorted, quickly, unable to contain the slight desperation to his voice. “Nothing to compel me with. And no ship. No way off this moon. Even you wouldn’t—”

“Wouldn’t I, Doctor?”

He hadn’t pressed the button, but the Doctor knew it was a near thing. Jo’s life, his freedom—he needed to think, needed to plan and reason, to be better, to capitalise on whatever advantage he could find, but he couldn’t, the damned headache, the damned prison, trapped, he felt trapped, he _was_ trapped.

“Fine,” he conceded, through gritted teeth. “I’ll — I’ll do what you want, just — leave Jo out of this.”

The Master bared his teeth in what he no doubt imagined was a charming grin, one that may have been more appealing had he not been seconds away from committing cold-blooded murder. He slid the disc back into his pocket, but kept his TCE pointed at the Doctor.

“There now, isn’t that better?” he said. As if his words were encouraging. As if any part of this was easy, or sustainable, or healthy. “I have so missed our little _contretemps_.”

The Doctor closed his eyes. He knew how he was meant to respond: a sharp rejoinder about the nature of time, a recognition of their shared and recent history. He also knew how he wanted to respond: a clear expression of disgust and revulsion, leaving the Master with no uncertainty about his feelings towards what he called their moments out of time. Neither of them made a difference.

Instead, the Doctor said, coolly, “Do you have anything for it, or was I meant to supply ahead of time?”

With his eyes still cast down, the Master’s reaction was shielded from him. Several possibilities occurred, popping up like bracken drifting through a river. Perhaps it was with a sneer and a calculated expression of lust. Maybe he was surprised by the verbal feint, in the same way that one might be surprised by any number of meaningless things. More intolerable still was the wisp of an idea that the Master, now unusually silent, might have been wounded. And what then — with his dark eyes flaring, the smile dropping away, caught off guard and unwilling to concede any ground — what then would they make of each other?

Probably some combination of all three was the real truth. It was easier not to know. Better, for both of them, that the Doctor had no interest in knowing.

“Doctor,” the soft rasp of his name almost made him flinch. For a moment he was tempted to open his eyes. But he didn’t. There was something too perfect about that tone, a resonance to it that was surreal.

He realised next that the Master hadn’t spoken aloud. The Master, who had withdrawn his telepathic presence so sharply earlier, was influencing his mind. The connection was being tested on all fronts, not so much a pressing flood as thin rivulets of water flowing down old and disused paths. The almost seamless way in which he integrated himself within the Doctor — gently, quietly, but purposefully — filled the Doctor with an undeniable stab of terror. There were too many points of entry for him to cut off each one as they came. Fear was one of the least productive emotions to maintaining psychic self-control and yet he couldn’t stop himself — he wanted to purge every last tendril from him, send the Master back damaged — he wanted out, out of this planet, out of this ship, out of this prison of a galaxy, somewhere he could run freely and never look back—

Panicked, he pressed back at the Master, trying to stem the patient flow of him through an overwhelming reply. Every stray thought the Doctor held, he forced back into the Master: disjointed and erratic emotional bursts seeping into dissonant unrealities. Brigadier, nausea, thick and fast—laughing with Jo and wanting to die—Draconia— _nobody is more devoted to the cause of peace than I am_ —Earth—the fear, the fear, the fire— _Mary had a little lamb_ —

“Doctor,” the Master said again, strained, but still not aloud; his words didn’t hum through the air. It was as if they were in space, the both of them — he’d sent them out the airlock, no oxygen, they were going to die and the Doctor _welcomed_ it.

He opened his eyes in time to see the Master physically recoil. Already, he had retreated from their connection. It gave the Doctor enough space to draw himself back in, burying the weaponised emotions that still prickled along his skin as though he were wrapped with live wires. If he needed to guard his mind for every moment more of this forced encounter, he would. He could not let the Master under his skin, or into his thoughts.

For a few moments, they dwelled in silence, gazing at each other.

“Perhaps — this is a mistake,” the Doctor said, realising it even as he said it. There was a strange expression on the Master’s face, one that he found impossible to quantify. It held his usual intensity, but poured into a wholly different direction. He remained silent. Undeterred, the Doctor persisted: “Whatever you have planned here, it’s not too late to stop it, old chap.” The precise, clinical ugliness of the Master’s expression didn’t waver. It was beginning to unnerve the Doctor, the unfamiliarity of it all.

But… no. To say it was unfamiliar was incorrect. The Doctor _had_ seen that look before: directed at malfunctioning experiments. A mix of scientific disdain and cold fascination. Only this time, instead of a disappointing mechanical failure, it was directed at him.

“We can still change it,” he continued, a last-ditch attempt at reason. “We can still change the way that this ends.” Briefly, the Master’s intensity thawed. He _was_ beginning to break through, after all this time. “If we contact Draconia and Earth—”

The Master laughed. It was a terrible, high sound. Almost unreal. The Doctor might have believed he was hearing it only in his mind. And yet, it was audible, sound given form to cut the space between them.

“Earth,” the Master said, a note of something more than sanity in his voice. “ _Earth_.” He laughed, again. Quieter this time. More restrained, as if this were a supremely amusing private joke. “No, Doctor. I think not.”

The Doctor shivered. The chill of the room was undeniable; it sapped the fight from his limbs.

 _Trapped_ , he thought, again, more of a death knell than an alarm siren this time. He let the admission of it settle inside of him, tried to anticipate when the terror would lodge itself in his throat. It didn’t come. All he felt was exhaustion.

“Have it your way,” he replied. His voice sounded steady, somehow, resolute and disappointed. It did nothing to shift that riveted expression of the Master’s. His grin was halfway to a grimace, a slash across his normally handsome face.

They had been so much more than this. It ached, still, that this should be what they were left as.

“Show me that charming little device of yours in action,” the Master said, in half a purr. It would have been more convincing if his voice wasn’t still rigid and slightly strangled. “Oh, not to worry about working it in dry — as per usual _I_ made sure to supply ahead of time.”

A thin tube of lubricant clattered to the floor, as the Master dropped it at his feet. The Doctor watched him for half a minute, warily, before rising to retrieve it.

“No, no, no, I don’t think that’s right, do you?” the Master chided, the jovial tone a stark contrast with the dangerous glitter in his eyes. “On your knees, Doctor. Crawl.”

The ache in the Doctor’s chest blossomed like a gunshot wound. Without replying, he sank to his knees. There, he hesitated, the space between them widening with each breath.

“My patience isn’t infinite,” the Master hissed, one boot grinding suddenly down onto the tube. “Fetch it, or go without; quickly, before I make the decision _for_ you.”

A familiar weight was settling upon the Doctor. Heady and comfortable. He remembered how this had felt. Surrendering it all up, all of the decisions and anxieties and complications. He had thought that it was freedom, once. Hardly. Just a different cage.

The Master slammed his shoe down onto the tube. It burst apart in a spray of glycerin, like a severed artery. The Doctor watched it happen, and said nothing. He felt nothing.

“Pity,” the Master observed. “It looks as though it will be a rather uncomfortable insertion. It truly _is_ a shame; if you get desperate enough, I’m sure you could scrape it back off the floor.” He dragged his boot through the residue, sneering. “Go on, Doctor. Don’t keep me waiting any longer: you know what an itchy trigger finger I have.”

The next few minutes blurred into each other. The Doctor’s sensory shock, the stunned incredulity of it all, warred with the certainty that the Master would kill Jo the second he felt slighted without an inch of remorse. Even a minor act of opposition right now might cause the end of her life. The Doctor’s head pounded, black and white pinpricks colouring his vision, his hearts pulsing in his throat.

Quietly, he rolled the sonic in between his fingers. This, he thought, with frosty, grief-stricken irony, was not the kind of field test he had been hoping for.

He ought to have been quicker in securing the lubricant: the scant amount of it splattered across the floor was already drying up. The Master was unfortunately right, the sonic _would_ be painful to take by itself, and now the Doctor had very little alternative.

At the very least, he had warmed the metal between his fingers. Unable to look at the Master, and feeling the unshakeable weight of his gaze regardless, the absurd reality of the situation let the Doctor drop further and further down into an artificial calm. His thoughts were beginning to narrow. Familiar feelings, ones that had been so tightly contained for so long, unfurled as he acknowledged his particular, neglected need. A need that only the Master had ever been able to fulfil. Admitting this, even to himself, didn’t give him the satisfaction he might once have derived. The temporal taste of it all was wrong, out of sync. Their _futurepastpresent_ was now a moment out of time; maybe it always had been. He didn't know which was worse.

The sonic was only slightly cool against his entrance. He pressed it against the soft tissue, knowing he couldn’t fit this in painlessly even with hours to work himself slowly open. Knowing just as well that he didn’t have hours. He may not even have minutes, before the Master grew bored and restless. Already his eyes were feverish in their intensity, gazing at the Doctor with something close to revulsion.

Worse yet, it occurred to him, in the growing quiet of his mind, that the Master’s expression was verging on the wrong side of heartsick.

It was an easy thought to dismiss. Easier still to slip into their time-worn habits. They used to spend days like this. The Master would curl around his mind like a cat at a mousehole; every time a thought drifted into his careless head, a new punishment, until he could learn to stop thinking entirely. It hadn’t been pain that motivated him to be better. It was the absence, the removal of sensation: feeling disconnected from his body, his mind, until the Master grew tired of maintaining a blanket denial over him. Afterwards, the Doctor would marvel at how raw his throat had gotten from the screaming he hadn’t been able to hear. The blood he hadn’t felt spilling from him. The agony of muscles he hadn’t known were stressed beyond the point of breaking.

It had all seemed so simple then. So easy, to be owned. But balanced against the call of the universe… They had talked of universes, when they were young; shared their dreams of what might lay beyond the strictures of Gallifrey. He had never imagined that the realisation of those dreams would come at the cost of being unable to recognise the person his friend had become.

 _Unable_ , came a thought he could no longer suppress, _or unwilling?_

“Hurry up,” the Master snapped, drawing the Doctor’s attention back once again. “Some of us are on a tight schedule. Places to be,” his mouth curled into a sneer, sliding into his own familiar armour, even if the smug overconfidence was not quite as seamless, “galaxies to conquer, worlds to burn.”

There it was. Their fundamental incompatibility stretched out before them, in a way it had been so many other times before. Yet, as ever, the sheer, categorical betrayal of it stung the Doctor’s hearts and stole the breath from his lungs.

The sonic simply felt numb in his hands. What did it matter if he could implode the airlock door? He knew he wouldn’t do it. He half-suspected, against all of his better judgement, that he _couldn’t_ do it. Without the intent to wield it, without a clever idea to foil the Master’s plots, the sonic truly was nothing more than a glorified sex toy.

There was nothing for it. Jo was counting on him. He couldn’t let pride and the living ghosts of old regrets be the cause of her death.

Biting the inside of his cheek, he set the screwdriver at his entrance again and, not letting the terror steal any more of his courage, nudged the tip of it inside. The sharp lip of the black magnet scraped his sensitive internal tissue; he winced and sucked in a breath.

“You can’t be complaining about a bit of pain, surely,” the Master scoffed, circling him. The TCE was left pointed at the floor, the threat of it seemingly forgotten when the Doctor was so undeniably ensnared. “Where’s your sense of scientific curiosity? Your thirst for adventure? Come, come, Doctor, you really have grown to become quite the disappointment.”

He didn’t smother the reflexive flare of shame quickly enough to remain unaffected by it. When he finally managed to work the full tip of the sonic inside of him, he let out the whine that had been trapped in his chest since his first, fumbling attempts to fuck himself. His eyes had drifted closed at some indeterminate point, and he was determined they should stay that way unless and until he was given a direct order. The sense of dizziness, the out of control nausea, the sheer, numb terror spiking through him; they were too much to experience if he was forced to look at the person making him feel this hopeless.

“Enough,” the Doctor said, dully. The pressure of the sonic edged him further into disbelief. He felt detached from his body, from the room, caught somewhere beyond. “Please.”

“ _Doctor…_ ” was the Master’s breathy response. “Use my name.”

The Doctor grit his teeth, fighting for purchase against the unreality warping his mind. Talking felt like pushing through treacle, the words heavy and slow to his mouth. “This won’t help you,” he managed. “Please, if you have any ounce of our friendship left within you, my dear fellow, we can—”

“Use,” the Master said, drawing the syllables out deliberately, “my _name_.”

Feeling the universe tilt into an unreachable freefall beneath him, the Doctor whispered, “Then you really must persist. I’d rather die.”

The universe jumped sharply back into focus when a backhand connected like a whip crack across his face. He found himself sprawled half on the bench, half dangling on the floor, the sonic uncomfortably full in his arse, having been jolted further inside when he had been flung backwards. Startled, his eyes instinctively snapped open.

The Master was flushed, rubbing his right hand with the other as though it had been scalded. Again and again he rubbed it, obsessive to the point of madness. He said nothing. Just stared at the Doctor through half-lidded eyes.

There were too many things he could say. More besides that he _should_ say. He was tired of doing either of them. The pain was good. Simple. He wanted more. It was as easy as that.

If he could no longer have his old friend back, he would take what he could scavenge from what they used to have. Consequences were for the future.

His throat clicked, voice almost extinguished beneath the weight of his selfish want. “Please,” he managed, raspy, wavering, “I — I need—” The sonic slipped suddenly underneath the hard ring of inner muscle he had been pushing it against without much thought of success. Needy and desperate, even to his own ears, the Doctor choked around a moan. It was more than halfway inside him now, grinding against his insides.

“I hardly think you’re in a position to be making demands,” the Master replied, his voice carefully measured even as that unnatural grin marred his face. He circled the Doctor once, prowling, deliberate, fingers dancing towards his face and then darting away in the next instance before he could flinch. “No, my dear Doctor, you are in quite a limited position indeed.”

The Master stepped back, gaze hooded and intense, as if admiring a work of art. Then he shook his head, slightly, that bright look clouding. “Come now, this is far from acceptable,” he scolded. “Present yourself properly, or you’ll be staying on this moon for the rest of your natural regeneration.” Quite unexpectedly, his voice gentled. “Have you forgotten so soon?” He paused, as if waiting for a response. The Doctor knew better than to try. Instead, he shifted slowly onto all fours, feeling the jolt of the screwdriver in his arse throbbing erratically through his pelvis.

It hurt. It hurt in a way he couldn’t begin to adjust for, the pain a bizarre thing of hot-cold, dull sharpness, too much and not enough at once. He fought against his body’s natural reaction to expel it, struggling to keep his mind ahead of his reflexes when all he wanted was for this to be over. He just needed more understandable pain, pain that could center him. And soon it would come. He knew the Master that well.

“Passable,” the Master said, the softness of his tone replaced in an instant by his usual arrogance. “Or it may have been, were you not at the same time sloppy, slow, ungrateful and uncivil. The list continues, of course, but let’s start there, for now.” He reached down, avoiding touching the Doctor entirely, and manipulated the controls at the base of the screwdriver.

The sudden vibration, jammed right into his sensitive insides, made him yelp. It was that pulsating setting, the four beats; mixed with the pain, the sensation was overwhelming. A grinding hum of machinery that forced him to feel pleasure when he wanted nothing, buzzing numbness spreading jerkily through his intestines.

His hands balled into fists, scrabbling for purchase on the slick flooring. “ _Don’t_ ," he choked out. “I can’t take—”

“Quiet!” the Master barked. Then he took a sharp breath, as if he had been startled by his own outburst. “You’ve said quite enough today as it is with your incessant moralising,” he finished, evenly.

The Doctor swallowed a wail, forcing it further back in his chest. He wanted out, knew he couldn’t handle much more of this. His legs had already begun to tremble, and he couldn't tell himself it was predominantly muscle fatigue. Shock had crept in, spreading like icy rot through his chest and into his limbs. Everything was blurring into a muddy fog, his normally sharp brain glazed. The physicality was only a partial element. Much worse was the continual, elemental awareness as to who was causing this distress: who consumed it so eagerly and so freely, who would consume _him_ if given half the chance.

He was fighting so many wars, across so many fronts, that he couldn’t prevent the hardness he could feel swelling between his legs. It was at total odds with the rest of him, so far detached that the scant pleasure it was bringing felt rancid. He couldn't quiet it every time the sonic’s rumbling vibrations hit a crescendo inside him.

Without the slap, perhaps he could have found escape within their old emotional sanctuary, within feelings of being owned, within how right and peaceful that used to seem. Now it was all just a cheap recreation. He couldn’t indulge this any longer. If the thought of continuing was vile, continuing to pretend that they were the people they had once been was nothing short of delusional.

His physical reaction was just another fanciful distraction from plain depravity. It wasn’t real. This pleasure was as dangerous as noxious gas; it had crept up on him, and now threatened to smother him with its choking finality.

He knew what he had to say, and to do; it was the first time he had ever said it. It would change something.

It had to.

“Stop,” he said. His voice was shaking as much as he was. “Stop this. I refuse to indulge this parody of intimacy.” The grind of the sonic through his pelvis wrapped another coil of dysphoric pleasure around his cock. It was too much. He couldn’t keep forcing himself to stay soft, as he had other times, couldn’t strangle the moans that broke from him.

“Why would I stop, when we’re both enjoying ourselves?” the Master asked, with a pointed glance downwards. His fingers threaded through the Doctor’s hair, leather-bound, gliding against the sensitive skin of the scalp, caressing. It was soothing to be touched like that. Nobody had in such a long time, not since Jamie, and he hadn’t quite the finesse. The quiet beckoned the Doctor again. Things could be good, things could feel lovely, if he would simply let himself feel them, then he _wouldn’t be so unhappy, let me in, Doctor._

No. _No._ He jerked away, as best he could, and said, “Turn it off.” After it was off, after it was out, he didn’t know what would happen. Only that it had to be better than now, feeling this awful weight between his legs. The endless pulsing in his arse, wringing some incomprehensible feeling from him. It had to be better, it had to be. “You’ve had your fun. Turn it—”

The hand in his hair became a stinging grip. He choked as it yanked his head upright, exposing his throat. The grip was firm against the roots of his hair, difficult to pull away from, and he looked reluctantly at the Master.

The Master studied him, eyes dark and critical. Then he cracked a thin smile.

“No,” he said. “No, I don’t think I will.”

The words sank into the Doctor's brain. For a moment he just stared at the Master, feeling his eyes widening against his better judgement. His hearts stuttered in his chest, out of sync, stealing the breath from him; his arms wavered between struggling further upright and giving into collapse. That the Master would sink to this, no, surely not, surely even he couldn't…

“You don't mean that,” the Doctor replied. At least his voice had found some measure of stability, even confidence, when all the rest of him was frozen. “I know you to be capable of a great degree of cruelty, but…” He broke off from giving life to the concept. Perhaps that would change the path that had been sketched out before him. Forcing his limbs out of their paralysis and into action, he began to rise.

Then he collapsed to his side, breathless again, pained, confused; residual pain bloomed from his diaphragm. A blow. How? From where?

The Master pushed him on his back with one boot, and pressed down on his chest, crushing him underneath the heel. The expression on his face warred between fury and distaste — and something else, something the Doctor was too blurry, too much in pain, to understand. Even panting was beyond the Doctor now; he struggled to breathe in thin gasps around the weight pressing him into the floor.

“There is something here that you have failed to comprehend, Doctor.” His name usually sounded so charming on the Master’s tongue; now it twisted into cold gallantry. “So allow me to clarify. I rescued you from certain death, you will agree.” 

Where the Doctor might have previously argued against this, he had neither the oxygen nor the wit to do so. The pressure was building, he could feel it, the force of the Master’s anger, higher and higher until the Doctor felt the grind of his ribcage from the inside out. Everything was spiralling out of control; he might break at any moment, might be cracked to the core, damaged in a way that couldn't be undone. 

“Oh, I am _quite_ pleased that we’re in agreement on that,” the Master continued, frigid as before.

Merciful relief that the boot abruptly lifted. The Doctor coughed, hard, too eager to breathe to do so efficiently.

Then that relief broke. An ice cube beneath the pressure of teeth: sudden and brittle. The words had caught up to his ears. If it wasn’t still beyond him, the Doctor might have choked with the hurt of them. The vibrations still pulsed within him, deep, unwanted. It was all repulsive. All of this, a genuine mockery of what he had thought – what he had _hoped_ –

Biting back tears (what would it matter), he shot the Master an incredulous glare. “What part of this could I possibly agree with?”

Another slap struck his cheek, sending him reeling back against the wall. It was almost the same as the last, except the Master giggled with laughter the moment his hand connected with the Doctor’s face.

“You’re going to play the blushing, repressed virgin, my dear?” the Master sneered. The light in his eyes was fanatical, close to reverent. His pupils were slits, the Doctor noted blandly.

Blood dripped from his bottom lip when the next slap connected; he had bitten his mouth to muffle noise. He didn’t want the Master to have any part of what he so obviously craved.

“Shall we instead play tit for tat,” the Master snarled, “and have you give up a regeneration? Hmm? Perhaps two, remembering the Keller Machine incident. Does that sound _more_ _agreeable to you?_ ”

A sharp stab of fear caught the Doctor in the chest. Another regeneration. He couldn't. Not so soon — he wasn't ready, he'd barely even _begun_ this life.

He tried to search the Master's face, but terror clouded his vision. It felt like flicking through a book with a trembling lamp as his only light.

Dying. Regenerating.

He'd lose everything. Again. Jo would look at his face with the blank politeness of a stranger. So would Alistair. No. He couldn't, he couldn't, he wouldn't let it—

The next blow to the head caught him off-guard.

“You _will_ obey me,” the Master snapped. He wasn't laughing, this time. “Or I will be quite happy to make it happen.”

There was something too promising in his voice to dismiss as a casual threat. He would destroy the Doctorʼs identity on a whim. Every relationship that wasn't theirs had always seemed unimportant to the Master. To claim a regeneration for his own would only be furthering a desire that had persisted through centuries.

The Doctor stared at him, and through him at the same time. He felt... old. One person couldn't be equipped for this much grief. All the sweetness of their reunion on Earth had been retrospectively spoiled, the very thought of those hidden nights and stolen trysts building as nausea at the back of his throat.

“Lie down,” the Master ordered. “On your front.”

Unable to stop the trembling of his legs, the Doctor did so. Lying on his stomach, he was at too odd of an angle to crane his neck to see the Master. All he could focus on was himself. Pinpricks of pain dripped onto a canvas of fear. Time reeled underneath him, a jagged and unsteady footing for his mind. His ears were ringing through a blurry haze. His jaw throbbed. 

At a footstep, he flinched. The step was light, but crisp. It stopped right before the top of his head. Finally, he could see something that wasnʼt grey flooring.

A breath of air touched his face, as the Master crouched down just above him.

“If you have to be forced,” said the Master, breathy, ragged, resolute, “then I must be the one to force you.”

The Doctor struggled upright, horror lending him strength. But the Master grabbed his arm and wrenched it behind his back. With a cry, the Doctor sank back onto the ground.

Panting, dizzy, he was unprepared for the Master straddling him. If his arm weren't still imprisoned, he might have tried to fight him off, but the Doctor knew he was fighting from a disadvantage. It was just so hard to know when an _advantage_ would present itself, if ever.

There was nothing in the Seven Pleiades that could have readied him. He’d expected another blow, this time to the back of his exposed head — or for an arm to wrap around his throat and choke him with all the force he knew the Master to be capable of. Instead, the Master slid a hand down the Doctor’s back. Fine leather caressed him with the care of someone handling an antique book. That hand slid, down, down—to the curve of the Doctor’s backside.

He reeled. “Nghgh!” he managed around the warm terror binding his throat. “What are you—?”

“Quiet,” the Master replied. His voice was so _dispassionate_. It was entirely unrecognisable. 

The Doctor baulked. Now had to be the time. Blindly, he scrabbled for the Master’s arms; tried to throw him sideways with one, decisive hip motion.

But the Master held steady. His rigid arms absorbed all the Doctor’s attempts to struggle free.

Bringing their hips into alignment, the Master rutted him—like an _animal_. Every thrust jammed the sonic deeper, the pressure tearing through his pelvis masquerading as mounting pleasure. He couldn’t possibly withstand it—no man could.

“I, I,” the Doctor said, “You really must—enough of this. There’s been—” his voice cracked “—stop, _please_ ,” he licked his lips; before he could regret it he whispered: “Mast—”

A hand clamped down around his nose and mouth. With a vicious squeeze, the Master cut him off.

“I told you to be quiet,” he said, gentle poison. “You can follow simple directions, can’t you? Of course you can.”

His hand returned to the Doctor’s rear. Unhurried, his fingers pushed the cheeks apart, brushing the downy pubic hair at the cleft of the Doctor’s arse.

The silence felt like a weight. It had been two regenerations since the Doctor had taken orders from the Master. The passage of time did not make it easier. Obey, disobey, he would be making the wrong choice.

He couldn’t help but wish he’d left Jo to die.

Frenzied by that thought, he tried to buck against the Master; using the leverage of his thighs, framed by the Master’s legs, he almost threw the Master off. The Masterʼs posture shifted, weakening. The Doctor knew he could summon enough strength to try again—

The Master thrust against him, and sighed in the shell of his ear. His new position wedged the sonic up so far, the Doctor’s vision doubled; his eyes rolled back briefly. Unbridled pleasure swept through him as a clenched muscle, the burning ache of a spasm. He was panting, he was moaning—making aborted vocalisations in his throat. It felt so _good_ , he thought. The awareness broke on him like a fever.

He felt the Master’s lips move before the man even began to speak. Honey-drunk, the Doctor listened:

“You always think you can escape from me. I’ve touched you in places that nobody ever has,” the Master paused, and ground himself idly. The Doctor writhed underneath him. “Or ever will.

“Not for want of interest, is it? No. I know you too well; you wouldn’t allow yourself to have what you wanted. What you _needed_. You drape yourself in fineries; in suits, and leather shoes, and beautiful things; all to hide your ugly pit of _need_.” He could feel the Master’s smile on his skin, and didn’t need to see it to know the way it adorned his face. “You think your bluster protects you from it. Protects you from _me_. But it doesn’t. Overcompensation lends you other faults; you’re brash, arrogant, overconfident.”

The Master breathed in, tremulous and heavy.

“ _Weak_ ,” he whispered, and thrust in to the hilt.

The Doctor bit back a scream.

“Donʼt,” he choked. “Stop.”

“I wonʼt stop,” the Master promised. He seized the Doctor’s throat, squeezed hard enough to leave black and white scintillations behind his eyes. All he could feel was the thrumming of his hearts. The light was fading. “Do you hear me, Doctor?” Even that voice was muddy, a hum instead of a snarl. “You can’t stop me.”

His reality seized upon itself, so closely fixated on maintaining its own shape that it became a grotesque inversion. Pain became euphoric; pleasure was unbearable. The Doctor contorted, his senses torn across all dimensions — he drank anger and guilt and righteousness as if it were his own. His essence stretched, pushing outwards until it surely had to break — surely it couldn’t extend forever, he couldn’t be trapped within infinity — in this self-contained hell—

The Master released his neck and the whole world imploded.

When next the Doctor could breathe, the sonic had fallen out of him. It continued to pulse, vibrating a course along the floor. Smeared with blood, it seemed a pathetic thing now. He watched it for long moments, watched it as though it were the only certain thing in the universe.

Behind him, the Master cleared his throat.

“Your clothes are where you left them,” was all that he said. It seemed so rudimentary that the Doctor barely understood it. Without a second glance, the Master pushed himself upright. He adjusted the cuffs of his jacket sleeves with brisk motions, tugged his gloves down, and left.

It was a very long time before the Doctor moved to dress. No thoughts intruded on his solitude. He pulled on each piece of clothing, feeling othered.

Once clothed, he bent down to pick up the sonic and found the handle was cracked. Strange, that he didn’t remember feeling it break. He turned it off, leaving the room finally silent. There would be no use for it now, broken as it was. He considered, dreamily, whether the internals were salvageable. 

Outside, he heard muffled shouting from the warden, interrupted by the Master’s supercilious voice. They were arguing over the delay.

The Doctor dropped the sonic, as though he’d been burned. The taste of oranges was a poison on his tongue.

Enough time had been wasted. He left the room to rejoin Jo.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic took just under two years to write, and it was a definite labour of love. I owe so much to so many people during the writing of this, such as Zampano for being my rock when I thought I truly was never going to finish this. I owe massive love and thanks to [extryn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/extryn) for her beta-ing, even when she said "hmmm, I don't think that works" on lines I absolutely loved. Without her, this fic would have nowhere near the polish and attention to detail that it has.
> 
> Lastly, I'm so appreciative of the Doctor Who fandom circles that I inhabit, especially the Doctor/Master server. I love all you guys so much, and you've been a brightness in the dark of the past year.


End file.
